1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to information handling systems and more particularly to a system for determining shortage costs.
2. Description of the Related Art
As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
Information handling systems are fabricated using multiple components arriving from multiple locations. Additionally, an information handling system manufacturer can make use of multiple manufacturing locations, which can be geographically dispersed. Additionally, with manufacturers, such as information handling system manufacturers, inbound supply chain and product line expansion can result in a growing coordination complexity which can result in increasing expedite spend to satisfy consumer and manufacturing needs.
For example, an information handling system manufacturer can have over 100 buyers supporting a plurality of different regions reviewing a large number (e.g., hundreds) of supply lines every day. One responsibility of the buyers is to communicate potential shortages and action plans in a timely manner. This responsibility can be especially challenging in an environment that does not provide the buyer with the autonomy to support their commodities without agreement being reached by different organizations where each organization can have differing objectives.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a system that can determine shortage costs in a repeatable and sustainable manner. It would be further desirable to provide such a system that can take into account different shortage costs that affect different organizations and weight those shortage costs against the costs to expedite material in to cover those shortages.